In recent years, web-centric operating systems (OSs) such as Google's CHROME OS have become a popular alternative to traditional desktop OSs such as Microsoft WINDOWS, MAC OS, and the like. Computing devices that run a web-centric OS are typically cheaper and easier to manage than desktop OS-based PCs or laptops. This is due, in part, to the fact that web-centric OS devices are largely stateless (i.e., most, if not all, of their data and applications are maintained/executed in the cloud) whereas desktop OS devices are stateful (i.e., such devices store/run a large proportion of their data/applications locally). As a result, web-centric OS devices are particularly attractive for medium to large-sized organizations (e.g., enterprises, school districts, etc.), since such organizations can significantly reduce the total cost of ownership of their end-user computing deployments by transitioning users to such devices.
One challenge with transitioning a user from an old computing device to a new computing device is that the new computing device may not support some of the user's desktop applications that are available on the old computing device. For instance, the new computing device may have a processor with a different architecture that cannot run the user's old desktop applications. Alternatively or in addition, the new computing device may have a new OS (e.g., CHROME OS) that is different from, or otherwise incompatible with, the OS running on the old computing device (e.g., WINDOWS). By way of example, consider an employee that uses a WINDOWS based laptop to, among other things, access an important work-related application that is only available on the WINDOWS platform. In this scenario, the employee would be unable to replace his/her WINDOWS based laptop with, e.g., a CHROMEBOOK, smartphone, or tablet device (e.g., an iPad or ANDROID based tablet), since he/she would no longer be able to use the application on the new device. As a workaround, the employee could keep the WINDOWS-based laptop, in addition to the CHROMEBOOK/smartphone/tablet, for the sole purpose of maintaining access to the application. However, this approach is cumbersome and negates many of the benefits of transitioning to a new device.